"The key of the tea-chest, please. The master is asking for tea."

"Let him wait, the scarecrow!"

CHAPTER III

In a short time Porfiry had completely lost all habits of sociability.

He no longer paid any attention to the confusion that had come into

his existence. He demanded nothing better of life than to be left

alone in his last refuge, his study. He had lost all his former ways

of cavilling with and pestering those about him, and he was timorous

and glumly meek. All ties between him and reality were cut. To hear

nothing, to see nothing, that was his heart's desire. The behavior of

Yevpraksia and the servants no longer concerned him. Formerly, had the

clerk allowed himself the least inaccuracy in presenting his reports

on the various branches of the household management, he would have

talked him to death. Now at times the reports were weeks late, and

he was unresentful except when he needed some data for his fantastic

computations. But when alone in his study he felt himself absolute

master, free to give himself over nonchalantly to inane musings. Both

of his brothers had died from drink. He, too, fell into the clutches

of drunkenness. But his intoxication was mental. Shut up in his study,

he racked his brains from early morning till far into the night over

fantastic problems. He elaborated various fabulous schemes, made

speeches before imaginary audiences, and wove whole scenes about the

first person that crossed his mind.

In this wild maze of fantastic acts and images a morbid passion for

gain played the most important part.

Porfiry Vladimirych had always had a strong leaning toward the

petty annoyance of people and litigation, but because of his lack

of practicality he had derived no direct profit from it. Sometimes

he was even the first to suffer. This proclivity of his was now

transferred to a world of abstractions and phantoms, where there was

no scope for resistance on the part of the oppressed and no need for

self-justification. The dividing line between the weak and the powerful

vanished. In that world there were no police or justices of the peace,

or rather, there were, but they existed solely for the purpose of

protecting his own interests. On this fantastic plane he could freely

enmesh the whole universe in his net of intriguing, cavilling, and

petty oppression.

He loved to torment people, ruin them, make them unhappy, suck their

blood--at least, in his imagination. He would look over the various

branches of his establishment and on each build up a fantastic

structure of all manner of oppression and plunder--a veritable

paradise, but the foulest ever conceived by a landed proprietor. And

everything depended here on overpayments and underpayments assumed

arbitrarily, each overpaid or underpaid kopek served as a pretext for

remodelling the entire edifice, which thus passed through endless

changes.

When his tired thoughts were no longer capable of following out all

the details of the intricate computations on which his imaginary

operations were based, he applied his imagination to a more plastic

material. He recalled every conflict and altercation he had had not

only in recent times, but far back in his youth, and he so manipulated

his reminiscences as always to come out the victor. He took revenge on

those of his former colleagues who had gone over his head in service

and had so deeply wounded his self-love that he renounced his official

career. He revenged himself on his schoolmates who had taken advantage

of their physical strength to tease or persecute him; on the neighbors

that had opposed his claims and stood up for their rights; on the

servants who had offended him or simply had not treated him with

sufficient respect; on "dearest mamma" Arina Petrovna for having wasted

too much of the money that "by law" belonged to him on the repairs

of Pogorelka; on his brother Simple Simon for having nicknamed him

Yudushka; on aunt Varvara Mikhailovna for having unexpectedly given

birth to children, with the result that the property of Gavryushkino

was forever lost to the family. He revenged himself on the living and

he revenged himself on the dead.

Gradually he worked himself into a state of actual intoxication. The

ground vanished from under his feet, wings grew on his shoulders, his

eyes shone, his lips trembled and foamed, his face grew ghastly pale,

and took on a threatening air. The atmosphere around him swarmed with

ghosts, and he fought them in imaginary battles.

His existence became so ample and independent that there was nothing

left for him to desire. The whole universe was at his feet, that

is, the universe of which his wretched mind could conceive. It was

something in the nature of ecstatic clairvoyance, not unlike the

phenomena that take place at the seances of mediums. His untrammeled

imagination created an illusory reality, rendered concrete and almost

tangible by his constant mental frenzy. It was not faith or conviction,

but unrestrained mental debauchery, a sort of trance in which his

tongue involuntarily uttered words and his body made automatic gestures.

Porfiry Vladimirych was happy. He locked up the windows and doors

that he might not hear, he drew down the curtains that he might not

see. He went through the customary functions and duties which had no

connection with the world of his imagination, in haste, almost with

disgust. When the ever-drunken Prokhor rapped at his door and announced

that dinner was served, he ran into the dining-room impatiently,

hurriedly swallowed his three courses and disappeared again into his

study. Something new showed in his manners--a mixture of timidity and

derision, as if he both feared and defied the few people whom he met.

He rose very early and immediately set to work. He cut down the time

devoted to worship, said his prayers indifferently, without thinking of

their meaning, crossed himself and went through the other gestures of

worship mechanically and carelessly. Apparently even the notion of a

hell with its complicated system of punishments was no longer present

in his mind.

Meanwhile Yevpraksia reveled in the satisfaction of carnal desires.

Dancing between the clerk Ignat and the coachman Arkhip, and also

casting glances at the red-faced carpenter Ilyusha, who was mending the

cellars at the head of a gang of workmen, she did not notice what was

going on in the manor-house. She thought the master was playing "a new

comedy," and many a light remark about the master was passed in the

jolly gatherings of the servants. But one day she happened to enter the

dining-room when Yudushka was hurriedly despatching the remnants of

roast goose, and suddenly a kind of dread fell upon her.

Porfiry Vladimirych wore a greasy dressing-gown, through the holes of

which the cotton interlining peeped out. He was pale, unkempt, and his

face bristled with a many days' growth.

"Dear master, what is it? What is the matter?" she turned to him in

fright.

Porfiry Vladimirych only smiled half sheepishly, half derisively, and

the meaning of his smile was: "I'd like to see how you could get at me

now."

"Darling master, what is the matter? Tell me, what has happened to

you?" repeated Yevpraksia.

He rose, fixed on her a gaze brimming over with hatred, and said,

pausing after each word:

"If you, you hussy, ever dare--enter my study--I will kill you!"

CHAPTER IV

As a result of this scene Yudushka's life outwardly changed for

the better. Distracted by no material hindrances, he gave himself

completely over to his solitude, so that he did not even notice how the

summer passed away.

It was late in August, the days grew shorter; it drizzled ceaselessly

and the soil became boggy. The trees looked mournful, with their

yellow leaves bestrewing the ground. Absolute silence reigned in the

court-yard and about the servants' quarters. The domestics sat quietly

under cover, partly because of the weather, partly because they finally

perceived that something was the matter with the master. Yevpraksia

came completely to her senses, forgot the silk dresses and her lovers,

and sat in the maids' room for hours on end, brooding and wondering

what she could do. The drunken Prokhor teased her that she had designs

on the master's life, that she had poisoned him and she could not

escape the road to Siberia.

Meanwhile, Yudushka sat in his study, deep in reveries. The ceaseless

patter of the rain on the window-panes lulled him half to sleep--the

most favorable state for the play of his fancy. He imagined he was

invisible and was inspecting his possessions, accompanied by old Ilya,

who had served as bailiff under Yudushka's father, and whose bones had

long since been rotting in the village churchyard.

"Ilya is a clever fellow," argued Porfiry Vladimirych with himself,

glad that Ilya had arisen from the dead. "An old servant! Nowadays his

kind is getting rare. Nowadays they know how to chat and fidget, but

when it comes to business, they're good for nothing."

After saying an appropriate prayer, Yudushka and Ilya pick their way

leisurely across meadows and ravines, dales and hills, and soon reach

the Ukhovshchina waste. For a while they stand dazed, unable to believe

their own eyes. Straight before them looms up a magnificent pine

forest, their tops tossing in the wind. Some of the trees are so big in

circumference that two or even three men could not embrace them. Their

trunks are straight, naked, crowned with mighty, spreading tops--all

signs of vigor and longevity.

"What a forest, brother!" exclaims Yudushka, enraptured.

"This wood has been protected from felling," explains Ilya. "Under your

late grandfather Mikhail Vasilyevich, a procession with holy ikons went

around it. And look how tall the trees have grown."

"How large do you think the forest is?"

"At that time it held just seventy desyatins, and the desyatin was

then, as you know, one and a half times the present size."

"And how many trees, d'you think, are there on one desyatin?"

"I can't tell. Only God has counted them."

"I reckon there are no less than six or seven hundred trees to a

desyatin. I mean the desyatin now used. Wait! If we take the number to

be six hundred--or, let us say, six hundred and fifty trees, how many

trees are there on one hundred and five desyatins?"

Porfiry Vladimirych takes a sheet of paper and multiplies 105 by 65 and

gets 6,825 trees.

"Now, see here, if I were to sell all this timber, do you think I can

get ten rubles a tree?"

Old Ilya shakes his head.

"Ten is little," he says. "Look at these trees. Each trunk will give

two mill beams and some planks and boards and firewood. What do you

think is the price of a mill-wheel beam?"

Porfiry Vladimirych makes believe he does not know, although he figured

out everything to a kopek long ago.

"Here," continues the peasant, "a beam is worth ten rubles, but if

we take it to Moscow it will be worth its weight in gold. It is a

tremendous beam. You will hardly haul it on a three-horse team. And

think of the second beam that can be made out of the stem, and the

boards and laths and firewood, and branches. Twenty rubles, I should

think, is the lowest price for a tree."

Porfiry Vladimirych listens and takes in his words greedily. A clever,

faithful servant this Ilya. And how well he has picked out his help!

Old Vavilo, Ilya's assistant--he too has been resting in the churchyard

for a good many years--is quite worthy of his superior. The foresters,

too, are all tried, stalwart men, and the hounds at the corn lofts are

fierce. Both the men and the dogs are ready to grapple with the devil

himself for the master's good.

"Let's figure out, brother. If we sell the whole forest, what will it

come to?"

Porfiry Vladimirych again makes a mental calculation of the value of

a large beam, a smaller beam, a plank, a lath, the firewood and the

branches. He adds up, multiplies, now omitting fractions, now adding

them. Columns of numbers fill the sheet.

"Here is the total, brother," says Yudushka, showing Ilya's phantom an

altogether fabulous sum. The old servant is dazed.

"Is it not a little too large?" he says, pensively shrugging his

shoulders.

But Porfiry Vladimirych has already cast off all doubts and giggles

gleefully.

"You are a queer fellow, brother!" he exclaims. "It isn't I who say it,

it's the number that says it. There is a science called arithmetic.

It never tells a lie, brother! Well, this will do for Ukhovshchina.

Now let's have a look at Lisy-Yamy, brother. It's a long time since I

have been there. I have a strong suspicion the peasants have become

thievish. There's Garanka, the guard--I know, I know. Garanka is a

good, faithful guard, that's true enough. Still, you know. It seems to

me he is not what he used to be either."

They plough noiselessly and unseen through a birch thicket, and stop

suddenly, holding their breath. A peasant's cart lies sprawling across

the road on its side, and the peasant is standing by, looking at the

broken axle in perplexity. He has been standing there for some time,

cursing the axle and himself and whipping the horse now and then.

Finally he sees he cannot loaf there all day long. He looks around

and pricks up his ears to make sure no one is coming along the road.

Then he selects a suitable birch tree, and takes out an axe. Meanwhile

Yudushka stands motionless and watches. The young birch shudders, sways

and suddenly sinks to the ground like a sheaf of corn, reaped by the

sickle. The thief is about to lop off the length of an axle from the

trunk, but Yudushka has decided that the moment has come. He steals

upon him and in a trice snatches the axe from his hand.

"Ah!" is all the thief, taken red-handed, has time to exclaim.

"Ah!" Yudushka mimics him. "Are you allowed to steal timber? 'Ah!' Is

it your birch-tree you have just felled?"

"Forgive me, sir!"

"I forgave everyone long ago, brother. I am myself a sinner before the

Lord and I dare not judge another. It is the law, not I, that condemns

you. Take the tree you have felled to the manor-house and pay up a fine

of one ruble. In the meantime, I shall keep your axe. Don't you worry,

it is in good hands, brother."

Glad that he was able to prove to Ilya how well-grounded were his

suspicions in regard to Garanka, Yudushka transports himself in

imagination to the forester's cottage and reprimands him soundly. On

his way back home he catches three hens belonging to peasants in the

act of feeding on his oats.

Back in his study, he falls again to work, and a peculiar system of

household management is suddenly born in his brain. The system is based

on the assumption that all mankind suddenly has begun to steal his wood

and damage his fields by letting cattle graze upon them. But this does

not grieve Yudushka, on the contrary he rubs his hands in delight.

"Let your cattle graze on my fields, fell my trees. I shall be the

better off for it," he repeats, hugely pleased. Then he takes a fresh

sheet of paper and resumes his ciphering and reckoning. The problems

to be solved are these: First, how much oats grows on one desyatin and

what will the fines amount to if the peasants' hens scratch the oats

up? And, second, how many birches grow in Lisy-Yamy and how much money

can they bring in if the peasants fell them illegally and pay the fine?

"A birch, though felled," reflects Yudushka gleefully, "will in the end

get to the house and be used as firewood--firewood free of charge, mind

you!"

Long rows of figures appear on the paper. Yudushka becomes so tired

and excited that he rises from the table all perspiring and lies down

on the sofa to rest. Here his imagination does not cease its work, it

merely selects an easier theme.

"Mamma was a clever woman, mamma was," muses Porfiry Vladimirych. "She

knew how to be exacting and how to set one at ease--that is why people

served her so willingly. Still she was not without sins. Oh, yes, she

had plenty of them."

No sooner does Yudushka think of Arina Petrovna than she appears before

him in person, coming straight from the grave.

"I don't know, my friend, I don't know what fault you have to find with

me," she says dejectedly, "it seems to me that I----"

"I know, I know," Yudushka cuts her short unceremoniously. "Let me be

frank and thrash out the matter with you. For instance, why did you not

stop Aunt Varvara Mikhailovna that time?"

"But how in the world could I stop her? She was of age, and she had the

full right to dispose of herself."

"Oh, no, permit me, mother dear. What sort of a husband had she? An old

drunkard, not much of a man, I should say. Nevertheless, they had four

children. Where did they come from, I'm asking you?"

"But how strangely you speak, my friend. As if I were the cause of it

all."

"Cause or no cause, you could have influenced her. You ought to have

treated her kindly, she would have been shamed by you. But you did the

contrary. You kept on scolding her and calling her shameless, and you

suspected almost every man in the neighborhood of being her lover. Of

course, she kicked up the dust. It's a pity. The Goryushkino estate

would have been ours now."

"You cannot forget that Goryushkino," says Arina Petrovna, evidently

brought to a standstill.

"What do I care for Goryushkino? I don't need anything. If I have

enough to buy a church candle and some oil for the image lamp, I am

satisfied. But what about justice, dear mamma, justice? Yes, mother

dear, I would be glad to hold my tongue, but I cannot help being frank

with you. There's a sin on your conscience, a great sin, indeed."

Arina Petrovna does not answer, and it is impossible to tell whether

she is dejected or merely perplexed.

"Another thing," Yudushka goes on, evidently reveling in mother dear's

embarrassment. "Why did you buy a house for brother Stepan?"

"I had to, my friend. I had to give him some share," says Arina

Petrovna, trying to defend herself.

"And he squandered it away, of course. As if you did not know him! You

knew he was a loafer, a disrespectful, foul-mouthed scamp. And to think

that you wanted to give him the Vologda village, too. A neat little

estate with a nice little forest and a tiny lake, lying like a shelled

egg--Christ be with it! It is well that I happened to be around and

kept you from taking that imprudent step. Ah, mamma dear, mamma dear,

how could you?"

"But he was a son of mine, you understand? A son!"

"I know, I understand very well. And still, I repeat, you ought not

to have done it. You paid twelve thousand for the house--where is the

money? And Goryushkino is worth at least fifteen thousand. So the loss

comes to quite a sum."

"Well, that will do, that will do. Don't be angry with me, please

don't!"

"I am not angry, dearest mother, I am only upholding the cause of

justice. What's true is true--and I loathe falsehood. I was born with

truth, have lived with truth, and with truth I shall die. God loves

truth and He would have us, too, love it. Take the case of Pogorelka,

for instance. I shall always say you invested too much money in it."

"But I myself lived there."

Yudushka clearly reads "You silly Bloodsucker!" on his mother's face;

but he makes believe he does not see.

"Well, yes, you lived there--still--the image-case is in Pogorelka.

Whose is it, I'd like to know. And the pony and the tea-caddy. I saw

that tea-caddy at Golovliovo with my own eyes, when papa was still

alive. What a beautiful little box!"

"Well, but----"

"No, dearest mother, let me speak. Of course it looks like a trifling

matter, but a ruble here, half a ruble there, come to quite a sum in

the end. Let me use exact figures and make it clear to you. Figures

are holy, they never lie."

Porfiry Vladimirych runs over to the table with the intention of

finally determining the exact amount of loss that his mother dear had

caused him to sustain. He manipulates the counting-board, covers sheets

of paper with rows of figures, arms himself to convict Arina Petrovna.

But fortunately for her his wavering thoughts cannot remain fixed on

one subject for a long time. Unnoticed by himself a new thought enters

his mind and, as if by magic, gives an entirely different trend to his

ideas. The image of his mother, a minute ago so clear before his eyes,

suddenly drops away. He forgets her, his notions become confused, other

notions enter his mind.

Porfiry Vladimirych has long had the intention of figuring out what his

crops could bring him in. The opportune moment is here. He knows the

peasant is always in want, is always on the lookout to borrow provender

and always pays his debts with interest. He knows also that the peasant

is especially generous with his work, which "costs him nothing," and

is not considered as possessing any value in settling accounts. There

are many needy people in Russia, oh, how many! There are many people

who do not know what the next day will bring them, who see nothing but

despair and emptiness wherever they turn their weary eyes, and who

hear everywhere only one clamor: "Pay your debt! Pay your debt!" It is

around these shiftless, utterly destitute men that Yudushka weaves his

net, with a delight passing sometimes into an orgy.

It is April, and the peasant as usual has nothing to eat. "You have

gobbled up all your crops, my dear fellows," Porfiry Vladimirych muses.

"All winter you feasted, and in spring your stomach is shrivelled from

hunger." He has just settled the accounts of last year's crops. The

threshing was completed in February, the grain was in the granaries in

March, and the amount was recorded in the numerous books the other day.

Yudushka stands at the window and waits. On the bridge afar off the

peasant Foka appears in his cart. At the bend of the road leading to

Golovliovo he shakes the reins rather hastily, and for want of a whip

hits his battered jade with his fist.

"He's heading here," whispers Yudushka. "Look at the horse. A wonder it

can drag its feet. But if you had fed it well a month or two, it would

become quite a horse. You might get twenty-five rubles for it, or even

as much as thirty."

Meanwhile Foka drives up to the servants' house. He ties the animal to

the hedge, throws it a handful of hay, and a minute later stands in the

maids' quarters, shifting from one foot to another. It is in the maids'

quarters that Porfiry Vladimirych usually receives such visitors.

"Well, friend, how are things going?"

"Please sir, what I need is some corn."

"How's that? Are you through with your own? What a pity! If you drank

less vodka, and worked more, and prayed to God, the soil would feel it.

Where one grain grows now, two grains would grow. Then there would be

no need for you to borrow."

Foka smiles vaguely, instead of replying.

"You think if God is far from us, He does not see?" Porfiry Vladimirych

goes on moralizing. "God is here and there and everywhere, he is with

us while we are talking here. He sees everything and hears everything,

he only pretends not to see things. 'Let my creatures live after

their own way, and we shall see whether they will remember me.' And we

sinners take advantage of that, and instead of buying a candle for God

from our meager means, we keep on going to the public-house. That's why

God gives us no corn. Am I not right, friend?"

"You are quite right, sir. There's no denying it."

"Well, you see, you understand it now. And why is it that you

understand it? Because the Lord withdrew His mercy from you. If you

had had an abundant crop of corn, you would carry on again, but since

God----"

"Right, sir, and if----"

"Wait a minute. Let me say a word. The Lord recalls Himself to those

who forgot Him. That is always the case. And we must not grumble over

it, but understand that God does it for our good. Were we to remember

God, He would never forget us. He would grant us everything, corn and

oats and potatoes--more than we need. And He would take care of our

animals. Look at your horse. It is skin and bones. And if you have

chickens, He would keep them in condition, too."

"You are quite right, sir."

"Man's first duty is to honor God, man's second duty is to honor

his superiors, those who have been distinguished by the czars

themselves--the gentry, for instance."

"It seems to me, sir, that I----"

"That's just it, 'it seems to me.' But give a little thought to the

matter, and you will find out that it's all different. Now when you

have come to borrow corn you are very respectful and bland. But two

years ago, you remember, when I needed harvesters and came to you

peasants to ask for help, what did you answer? 'We have to harvest

ourselves,' you said. 'It is not the way it used to be,' you said,

'when we worked for the landlords. Now we are free!' Free, and no corn!"

Yudushka looks at Foka, but Foka does not stir.

"You are very proud, that's why you have no luck. Take me, for example.

The Lord has blessed me, and the Czar has distinguished me. But I am

not proud. How can I be? What am I but a worm, a moth, a nothing. God

took and blessed me for my humility. He loaded me with favors, and put

it into the Czar's mind to favor me, too."

"Porfiry Vladimirych, I think that under serfdom we were far better

off," Foka remarks, playing the flatterer.

"Yes, brother, those were fine days for you peasants. You had plenty of

everything, corn and hay and potatoes. But why recall the old times? I

am not rancorous. I have long forgotten about the harvesters. I only

mentioned them in passing. Let me see--did you say you needed corn?"

"Yes, I did, sir."

"You have come to buy some, have you?"

"How can I? I should like to borrow some until the new corn comes."

"My, my! Corn is not to be had for money nowadays. I really don't know

what to do with you."

Porfiry Vladimirych ponders for a while, as if really perplexed.

"I can lend you some corn, my friend," he finally says. "I have none

for sale, for I loathe to traffic in God's gifts. But I will gladly

lend you some corn. To-day I'll lend to you, to-morrow you'll lend to

me. To-day I have plenty. Take some, help yourself. You want a measure

of corn? Take a measure. You want half a measure? Take half a measure.

Tomorrow may find me knocking at your window saying, 'Dear Foka, lend

me half a measure of corn, I have nothing to eat.'"

"Oh, sir, will you come to me?"

"I shall not. That was merely an example. The world has seen greater

reverses. There was Napoleon, about whom the newspapers have written so

much. That's how it is, brother. So how much corn do you want?"

"A measure, if you please."

"Well, I can let you have a measure. Only let me warn you, corn is

tremendously dear nowadays. This is what we are going to do: I shall

give you six chetveriks, and in eight months you will deliver a measure

to me. I don't take any interest, but an additional chetverik or

two----"

Yudushka's offer makes Foka gasp. For some time he says nothing, only

shrugs his shoulders. "Won't that be a bit too much, sir?" he says at

last, evidently alarmed.

"If it's too much, go to others. You see, my friend, I am not forcing

you, I am only making you an offer in a friendly way. I didn't send for

you, did I? You came here yourself. You came to ask for something and

that's my answer. Isn't it so, friend?"

"Yes, quite so, but don't you think it's too much interest?"

"Ah, ah, ah! And I thought you were a just, respectable peasant. Well,

you will say to me, what am I going to live on? How will I meet my

expenses? Do you know what expenses I have? My dear man, there is no

end to them. I've got to pay here, and meet my obligations there, and

produce cash in a third place. I've got to satisfy every one. All are

after Porfiry Vladimirych, all ask something of him, and I've got to

get along with them as best I can. And then again, if I sold the corn

to the dealer, I should get money at once. And money, my friend, is

a sacred thing. With money I can buy securities, put them in a safe

place, and draw interest. No worry, you know, of any kind, no trouble

at all. Just clip the coupon and get your money. But with the corn

you've got to go carefully about it, and look after it, and all that.

A lot of it will dry up, and be wasted, and the mice will eat it up.

No, brother, money is the best thing--nothing like it! It would be high

time for me to become sensible and turn everything into money and leave

you folks."

"Oh, Porfiry Vladimirych, stay with us."

"Well, my dear man, I should like to, but I can't stand it any longer.

If I had the strength of my youth, of course I would stay with you

and keep at it. But no, it's time to rest. I will go to the Trinity

Monastery, I will find shelter under the wing of the saints, and not a

soul will hear from me. And how good I'll feel! All will be peaceful

and quiet and honest; no noise, no quarrels--like in Heaven."

In a word, in spite of all of Foka's protestations, Porfiry Vladimirych

arranges the bargain to suit himself. But that is not enough. At the

very moment that Foka consents to the terms of the loan, a thought

flashes through Yudushka's mind. A certain Shelepikha meadow appears on

the scene. It doesn't amount to much, hardly a desyatin to mow.

"You see, I am doing you a favor, so you do me one in turn," says

Porfiry Vladimirych. "This is not interest, but just a favor. God does

favors to us all, and we've got to do likewise to one another. You will

mow this desyatin in no time, and I'll be much obliged to you. You see,

brother, I am a plain man. You'll do me a ruble's worth of service, and

I----"

Porfiry Vladimirych rises, faces the church, and makes the sign of the

cross to show that the transaction is at an end. Foka also rises and

makes the sign of the cross.

Foka has disappeared. Porfiry Vladimirych produces a sheet of paper,

arms himself with the counting-board, and the beads begin jumping

fast under his skilful fingers. Little by little an orgy of numbers

commences. The whole world becomes enwrapped in mist. With feverish

haste Yudushka passes from the paper to the counting-board and from the

counting-board to the paper. The rows of figures keep growing larger

and larger.

BOOK VII

THE SETTLEMENT

CHAPTER I

It is the middle of December. The country stretches still and benumbed,

covered with a mantle of snow as far as the eye can reach. The

horses, though pulling empty carts, wade with difficulty through the

snow-drifts that the wind has driven during the night. There is not the

trace of a path to the Golovliovo estate.

Porfiry Vladimirych had grown so unaccustomed to visits that in the

beginning of autumn he barred the front entrance to the house and the

main gateways leading to it, leaving only the servants' entrance and

the side gates for the domestics to communicate with the outer world.

One morning as the clock was striking eleven, Yudushka in his

dressing-gown was standing at the window staring aimlessly before him.

Since early morning he had been walking to and fro in the room, deep

in thought about a certain momentous matter, and ceaselessly counting

imaginary profits. Finally, he became mixed in the ciphering and grew

tired. Both the magnificent orchard in front of the manor and the

village behind it were lost to view in the snow. After yesterday's

blizzard the air was frosty, and the snow shimmered and sparkled in the

sun, so that Porfiry Vladimirych had to blink. The court was silent and

deserted. There was not the least movement, either in the servants'

quarters or near the cattle yard. Even the village itself was so silent

that it seemed as if death had suddenly stolen upon the people. The

only thing that attracted Yudushka's attention was a curl of thin smoke

floating upward from the priest's house.

"Eleven o'clock, and the parson's wife has not yet finished cooking,"

he thinks. "Those black coats are always gorging."

With this as a point of departure, his mind wandered on. Was it a

weekday or a holiday, a fast day or not, and what can the parson's

wife be cooking? But suddenly his attention was diverted. On the hill

at the very beginning of the road from the village of Pogorelka a

black dot appeared, approached gradually and grew larger and larger.

Porfiry Vladimirych looked intently. "Who could be coming, a peasant or

somebody else? Who could it be but a peasant? Yes, a peasant! What was

he coming for? If for wood, why, then, the Naglovka forest was on the

other side of the village. The knave must be intending to steal some

wood. If he was making for the mill, why, then, he ought to have turned

to the right. Perhaps he was coming to fetch the priest. Someone dying,

or, perhaps, already dead? Or maybe a child had been born? Who could it

be? In autumn Nenila walked about pregnant, but it was too early for

her. If it should be a boy, he would get into the census. What was the

population of Naglovka at the last census? But if a girl, she would

not get into the census, and----Still, it is impossible to get along

without the female sex. Fie!"

Yudushka spat and looked at the ikon in the corner, as if seeking its

protection from the Evil One.

It is quite possible that he would have continued wandering in thought

had the black speck been lost to view, but it kept on growing and at

last turned toward the marsh road leading to the church. Then Yudushka

saw quite clearly that it was a small wagon pulled by two horses, one

behind the other. Next it went up the hill, and drove past the church.

"Perhaps it is the bishop," passed through his mind. "That's why they

have not yet finished cooking at the parson's house." Then the vehicle

turned to the right and made straight for the manor-house. Porfiry

Vladimirych instinctively drew his dressing-gown together and stepped

away from the window, as if afraid of being seen by the traveller.

He had guessed correctly. The wagon drove up to the house and stopped

at the side gate. A young woman jumped out of it quickly. She was

dressed out of season in a large cotton-lined greatcoat trimmed with

lamb's fur, more for show than for warmth. She was apparently frozen.

No one appearing to receive her, the stranger hopped over to the maids'

entrance. In a few seconds the outer door in the women's quarters

banged shut, then another door, and another, until all the rooms

adjacent to the maids' entrance were filled with a noise of hurried

footsteps and banging doors.

Porfiry Vladimirych stood at his study door listening intently. It was

so long since he had seen any strangers, and altogether he had become

so unaccustomed to the company of human beings, that he was somewhat

bewildered. Nearly a quarter of an hour passed, the running and the

banging of the doors continued, and yet he was not told who had come.

It was clear that the guest was a relative, who did not doubt her

right to the host's hospitality. But what relatives had he? He tried to

recall them, but his memory was dull. He had had two sons, Volodka and

Petka; he had had a mother, Arina Petrovna--long, long ago! Last autumn

Nadka Galkina, daughter of his late aunt Varvara Mikhailovna, had taken

up her residence at Goryushkino. Could it be she? Why, no. She had

already tried to make her way into the Golovliovo temple, but to no

avail.

"She will not dare to, she will not dare to!" reiterated Yudushka,

burning with indignation at the very thought of her intrusion. "But who

else can it be?"

While he was busy guessing, Yevpraksia approached the door cautiously

and announced:

"The young lady of Pogorelka, Anna Semyonovna, has arrived."

It was indeed Anninka, but changed beyond recognition. She was no

longer the beautiful, lively, buoyant girl with rosy cheeks, full

gray eyes, high breast and heavy, ash-colored tresses massed low on

her head, who had come to Golovliovo shortly after the death of Arina

Petrovna, but a weak, wasted creature with a sunken chest, hollow

cheeks, a hectic face and languid movements--a bent creature, almost

hunch-backed. Even her splendid braids looked miserable, and her eyes,

blazing feverishly, seemed larger than ever in her emaciated face. Her

eyes alone retained something of their former beauty. Yevpraksia stared

long at her as at a stranger, then finally recognized her.

"You?" she cried out, clapping her hands.

"I. Well?"

Anninka laughed quietly, as if to add, "Yes, life has played me a dirty

trick."

"Is uncle well?"

"Uncle? Nothing is the matter with him. He is alive, there is no doubt

about that, but we hardly ever see him."

"What's the matter with him?"

"Just so--it's all because of lonesomeness."

"Don't tell me he has stopped haranguing?"

"He is real quiet now, miss. He used to talk and talk, but suddenly he

became silent. Occasionally we hear him in his study talking to himself

and sometimes even laughing, but as soon as he comes out of the room he

is quiet. People say his late brother, Stepan Vladimirych, had the same

trouble. At first he was gay, then suddenly he became quiet. And you,

madam, are you well?"

Anninka only waved her hand in reply.

"And is your sister well?"

"She has been lying in her grave at the wayside at Krechetovo a month."

"Lord be merciful! At the wayside!"

"Of course, that's how they bury all suicides."

"Goodness! A lady--and to take her own life! How is that?"

"Yes, at first she was a 'lady,' and then she took poison, that's all.

And I, I am a coward, I want to live, and here I have come to you. Not

for long, oh, don't be afraid. I shall die soon, too."

Yevpraksia stared at her, as if she did not understand.

"Why are you looking at me? Am I such a fright? Well, never mind my

looks. However, I'll tell you later--later. Now pay the coachman and

announce me to uncle."

She produced an old pocketbook and took out two yellow bills.

"And here is all my property," she added, pointing to a small trunk.

"Here's everything, both my inheritance and my own acquisitions. I am

cold, Yevpraksia, very cold. I am quite sick, there's not a bone in my

body that doesn't ache, and here as if to spite me, it is so cold. As I

was riding, I thought of only one thing, to get to Golovliovo, and die

there, at least in warmth. I'd like to have some vodka. Have you any?"

"You had better have some tea, madam. The samovar will soon be ready."

"No, I shall have tea later. Now I'd like to have some vodka. However,

don't tell uncle about the vodka yet. It will all come out later."

While they set the table for tea in the dining-room Porfiry Vladimirych

appeared. Now Anninka in her turn was completely surprised at her

uncle's emaciation and wild, faded looks. Porfiry received Anninka in

a strange manner, not coldly, but as if altogether indifferent. He

spoke little, as if under compulsion, like an actor trying to recall

sentences of parts acted in days gone by, and was absent-minded, as

though his mind were absorbed in some grave, urgent business from which

he had been torn away to attend to trifles.

"So you have arrived?" he said. "What will you have, tea, coffee? Order

the servants to fetch it."

In former days, at family meetings, Yudushka always played the

sentimental part. This time it was Anninka who was filled with

emotions, genuine emotions. The claw of sorrow must have sunk deep

into her being, for she threw herself on Porfiry Vladimirych's breast

and embraced him ardently.

"Uncle, I have come to you!" she cried, and burst into tears.

"Well, you are welcome. I have enough rooms. Live here."

"I am sick, uncle, very, very sick."

"If you are sick, you must pray to God! Whenever I am not well, I

always heal myself through prayer."

"I have come to you, uncle, to die."

Porfiry Vladimirych looked at her with questioning eyes, and an almost

imperceptible smile stole over his lips.

"So that is where your acting has brought you?"

"Yes, that is where my acting has brought me. Lubinka is dead and I--I

am alive,"

At the news of Lubinka's death Yudushka piously crossed himself and

whispered a prayer. Anninka seated herself at table, her chin in her

hands, looking toward the church and continuing to cry bitterly.

"See here, as for weeping and being in despair, it is surely a sin,"

remarked Porfiry Vladimirych sententiously. "And do you know what

a Christian must do on such an occasion? Not cry, but submit and

hope--that's how a Christian has to act."

But Anninka threw herself back on the chair and repeated, her arms

drooping helplessly:

"Ah, I do not know, I do not know, I do not know!"

"If you are crying your eyes out on account of your sister," Yudushka

continued to sermonize, "that is a sin, too. For although it is

praiseworthy to love one's sisters and brothers, yet, if it be the will

of God to take one or several of them to Himself----"

"Oh, no, no! Uncle, are you kind? Are you kind? Tell me!"

Anninka threw herself on him again and embraced him.

"Well, I am kind, kind. Tell me, do you wish anything? Will you have a

bite, or tea, or coffee? Ask for what you want. Order it."

Anninka suddenly remembered how during her first visit her uncle used

to ask her, "Will you have beef, pork, potatoes?" And she realized that

she would find no other consolation.

"Thank you, uncle," she said, seating herself at the table again. "I do

not want anything in particular. I am sure I shall be contented with

anything you offer me."

"If so, well and good. Will you go to Pogorelka?"

"No, uncle, for the time being I shall stay with you. You have nothing

against it, have you?"

"Christ be with you, of course I don't object. I asked about Pogorelka

only because in case you do wish to go there, it would be necessary to

arrange for a wagon and horses."

"No, later, later."

"Very well, then. You will go there later on. Meanwhile you can stay

with us. You will help about the house, for I'm all alone, you see.

This queen," said Yudushka, almost in hatred, pointing to Yevpraksia

pouring the tea, "is all the time running about in the servants'

quarters, so that sometimes you can never get any service, not a soul

in the whole house. Well, good-by for the present. I shall go to my

room. I shall pray, do some work and pray again. So, my friend. Is it

long since Lubinka died?"

"About a month, uncle."

"Then tomorrow we shall go to church early and order a mass to be

read for God's recently deceased servant Lubinka. So good-by for the

present. Have some tea, and if you want a bit of luncheon, have the

servant bring it to you. At dinner we shall meet again, have a talk,

a chat. And if anything has to be done, we shall attend to it, if

not--not."

Such was the first family meeting. When it was over, Anninka entered

upon her new life in that disgusting Golovliovo, where she was stranded

for the second time in her short life.

CHAPTER II

Anninka had gone downhill very fast. It was true that her first visit

to Golovliovo had aroused the consciousness of being a "lady," of

having her own nest and her own graves, of not being confined in her

life to the squalor and uproar of hotels and inns, and of having a

shelter where she would be safe from vile breaths infected with the

odor of wine and the stable, from hoarse voices, bloodshot eyes,

indecent gestures. But alas! No sooner did Golovliovo disappear from

sight than this purifying consciousness vanished from her mind.

Anninka had gone from Golovliovo straight to Moscow, and solicited a

position on the government stage both for herself and her sister. With

this in view she turned for aid to _maman,_ that is, the directress of

the boarding-school where she had been educated, and to several of her

classmates. _Maman_ was at first quite kind to her, but as soon as she

discovered that her former pupil had acted on the provincial stage,

her pleasant manner changed to one of haughtiness and sternness. As

for Anninka's classmates, who were mostly married women, they eyed her

with an impertinent astonishment that quite frightened her. Only one

of them, better-natured than the rest, asked her, evidently wishing to

show sympathy:

"Tell me, darling, is it true that when you actresses dress for the

stage, officers lace your corsets?"

In a word, her attempts to gain a foothold in Moscow remained

unsuccessful. The truth of the matter was, she did not possess the

necessary qualifications for theatrical success in the capital. She

and her sister Lubinka belonged to that class of lively, but not very

talented actresses who play one part all their lives. Anninka had made

a hit in _Pericola,_ Lubinka in _Pansies_ and _Old-time Colonels,_ and

whatever new rôles they studied strangely resembled their successful

parts, or, in the majority of cases, were a complete failure. Anninka

often had to play _Fair Helen_ also. She would wear a flaming red wig

over her ash-colored hair, and cut her tunic down to her waist line,

but she was mediocre and dull, not even cynical. From _Fair Helen_ she

passed to the _Duchess of Herolstein._ In this her colorless acting

was coupled with a completely preposterous _mise en scène_, and the

outcome was altogether miserable. At last she undertook to play the

role of Clairette in _The White Slave._ But she overdid her part to

such an extent that even the none too refined provincial public was

shocked by her behavior on the stage, which she turned into a mire of

corruption. Anninka gained the reputation of being a clever actress

with a fairly good voice, and since she was pretty, she could get an

audience in the provinces. But that was all. Lacking individuality, she

could not attain permanent success. Even among the provincial public

she was popular mainly with army officers, whose chief ambition was to

obtain access behind the scenes. She could have got an engagement in

the capital only if she had been forced upon some manager by a powerful

patron, and even then the public would have given her the unenviable

nickname of "a tavern singer."

Thus the two girls had to go back to the provinces. In Moscow Anninka

received a letter from Lubinka, saying that their company had removed

from Krechetov to the city of Samovarnov, which made Lubinka quite

glad, because there she had become friendly with a certain zemstvo

leader, who was so infatuated that he was almost, in his own words,

"ready to steal the zemstvo funds, if that were necessary to gratify

all her desires."

In fact, on her arrival in Samovarnov, Anninka found her sister quite

luxuriously situated and planning to give up the stage. Lubinka's

admirer, the zemstvo official Gavrilo Stepanych Lyulkin, was a retired

captain of the Hussars, recently a _bel homme,_ but now somewhat

corpulent. His appearance and manners and views taken separately were

conspicuously noble, but taken together they gave one the strong

impression that the man was altogether free from scruples. Lubinka

received Anninka with open arms and told her a room had been prepared

for her at the lodgings.

Anninka, still under the influence of her trip to Golovliovo, bridled

up at the suggestion. The sisters exchanged tart words, and soon

afterwards they separated. Involuntarily Anninka recalled the words

of the Volpino parson, who had told her it was hard to safeguard a

maiden's "honor" in the acting profession.

Anninka went to live at a hotel and broke off all relations with her

sister. Easter passed. The next week the theatres opened, and Anninka

found out that her sister's place was already filled by Nalimova, a

girl from Kazan, a mediocre actress, but utterly unconstrained in

the movements of her body. As usual, Anninka played _Pericola_ and

enchanted the Samovarnov theatregoers. On her return to the hotel,

she found an envelope in her room containing a hundred ruble bill and

a laconic note which read: "Should anything happen, you get as much.

Merchant Kukishev, dealer in fancy goods." Anninka was enraged and went

to complain to the hotel-keeper. He told her Kukishev had this peculiar

habit of greeting the newly arrived actresses, and otherwise was a

harmless man and it did not pay to take offence. Anninka sealed up the

letter and the money in an envelope, sent it back the very next day,

and regained her composure.

But Kukishev was more persistent than the hotel-keeper had reported

him to be. He was among Lyulkin's friends and was on good terms with

Lubinka. He was quite well-to-do and, besides, as a member of the city

administration was in a most convenient position with regard to the

city treasury. And like Lyulkin, boldness was not his least virtue.

According to the taste of market people he possessed a seductive

appearance, reminding one of the beetle, which, as the song has it,

Masha found in the fields instead of berries:

/$

"A beetle black, and on his crown

Nice curly hair, with whiskers smart,

His eyebrows colored a dark-brown,

The picture of my own sweetheart."

$/

Being the happy possessor of such looks he thought he had the right to

be aggressive, all the more so as Lubinka explicitly promised him her

cooperation.

Lubinka, apparently, had burned all her bridges, and her reputation was

by no means a pleasant topic in her sister's ears. Every night, it was

said, a merry band caroused in her rooms from midnight till morning,

Lubinka presiding and appearing as a "gypsy," half naked (at this,

Lyulkin, addressing his intoxicated friends, would cry out, "Look,

there's a breast!") and with loosened hair. She would sing to the

accompaniment of a guitar:

/$

"How I did love it with my mash,

Who had the darlingest mustache!"

$/

Anninka listened to the stories about her sister and became greatly

worried. What surprised her most was that Lubinka sang the ditty about

the "mash who had the darlingest mustache" in a gypsy-like manner,

just like the celebrated Matryusha of Moscow. Anninka always gave her

sister due credit, and had she been told that Lubinka sang couplets

from _Old-time Colonels_ with unsurpassed excellence, she would have

considered it quite natural and would have readily believed it. The

theatergoers of Kursk, Tambov and Penza had not yet forgotten with what

inimitable naïveté Lubinka sang the most atrocious ambiguities in her

soft little voice. But that Lubinka could sing like a gypsy--pardon

me! A lie! She, Anninka, could sing like that, no doubt of it. It was

her genre, her business, and everyone in Kursk who had seen her in the

play, _Russian Romances Personified,_ would willingly testify to it.

Anninka would take the guitar, sling the striped sash over her

shoulder, sit down on a chair, cross her legs and begin: "I-ekh!

I-akh!" It was the very manner of Matryusha the gypsy.

However that may have been, one thing was certain, that Lubinka was

extravagant. And Lyulkin, for fear of introducing a discordant note

into the drunken bliss, had already resorted to borrowing from the

zemstvo treasury. Not to speak of the tremendous amount of champagne

which was both consumed and poured out on the floor in Lubinka's

quarters, all sorts of things had to be provided to feed her growing

capriciousness and extravagance. First it was dresses from Mme.

Minangois of Moscow, then jewelry from Fuld. Lubinka was rather thrifty

and did not scorn valuables. Her licentiousness by no means interfered

with her love of gold, diamonds and especially lottery bonds. At any

rate, it was a life not of gaiety, but of boisterous debauchery and

continuous intoxication.

There was one thorn in the rose-bush. It was necessary for Lubinka to

curry favor with the chief of police. Although a friend of Lyulkin's,

he sometimes liked to make his power felt, and Lubinka always guessed

when he was dissatisfied with her hospitality, for the next day the

police warden would come to ask for her passport. And she yielded. In

the morning she would treat the district chief of police to vodka and

a light repast, while in the evening she would personally prepare a

"Swedish" punch of which he was very fond.

Kukishev watched this ocean of luxury and burned with envy. He

conceived a desire to lead a similar life and have just such a

mistress. That would put an end to the monotony of provincial life. One

night he would spend with Lyulkin's queen, the next night with his own

queen. That was the dream of his life, the ambition of an imbecile,

who is the more obstinate in his strivings the greater his stupidity.

Anninka seemed to be the most suitable person for the realization of

his hopes.

But Anninka would not surrender. She was still new to the stir of

passion, although she had had numerous suitors and had been rather

free in her relations with them. At one time she even thought she was

ready to fall in love with the local tragedian Miloslavsky X, who was

consumed with passion for her. But Miloslavsky X was so hare-brained

and so persistently drunk that he never told her of his love, only

stared at her and stolidly hiccoughed when she passed by. So the love

affair never ripened. The other suitors Anninka considered as something

in the nature of indispensable furniture, to which a provincial actress

is doomed by the very conditions of her profession. She submitted to

these conditions, and took advantage of their minor privileges, such as

applause, bouquets, drives, picnics, etc., but further than this so to

speak external dissipation, she did not go.

She persisted in this manner of conduct. During the whole summer she

had kept to the path of virtue, jealously guarding her honor, as if

anxious to show the Volpino priest that moral strength can be found

even among actresses. Once she even decided to complain about Kukishev

to the governor, who listened to her with kindly favor and commended

her for her heroism. But seeing that her complaint was an indirect

attack on his own person as the governor of the province, he added

that, having spent all his strength against the internal enemy, he

strongly doubted whether he could be of any use. Hearing this, Anninka

blushed and went away.

Meanwhile Kukishev acted so artfully that he succeeded in making

the public take an interest in his efforts. People suddenly became

convinced that Kukishev was right and that Pogorelskaya I, as she was

dubbed on the posters, only looked as if butter would not melt in her

mouth. A whole clique was formed with the express purpose of taming

the refractory upstart. The campaign was started by several habitués

of the theatre who gradually began to hang around her dressing-room

and made their nest in the adjoining room belonging to Miss Nalimova.

Then, without exhibiting direct enmity, the audiences began to receive

Pogorelskaya I, when she appeared on the stage, with a disheartening

reserve, as if she were not the star actress, but some insignificant

dumb performer. At last the clique insisted that the manager take some

parts away from Anninka and give them to Nalimova. And what was most

curious, the most important part in this underhand intrigue was played

by Lubinka, whose confidant was Nalimova.

Toward autumn Anninka was surprised to find that she was compelled to

play the rôle of Orestes in _Fair Helen_, and only Pericola had been

left to her of all her main parts. That was because Nalimova would not

dare to vie with her in the rôle. In addition, the manager notified her

that in view of her cold reception by the audiences, her salary would

be reduced to seventy-five rubles a month, with only half the proceeds

of one benefit during the year.

Anninka lost courage, because with so small a salary she would have

to move from the hotel to an inn. She wrote letters to two or three

managers offering her services, but invariably received the answer

that they were actually flooded with applicants for the Pericola rôle,

and besides, they had learned of her shrewish obstinacy from reliable

sources, and so could not foresee any hopes of her success.

Anninka was now living on her last savings. Another week and she would

have to move to the inn and live with Khoroshavina, who was playing

_Parthenis_ and was favored with the attention of a constable. She

began to yield to despair, especially since a mysterious hand put a

note into her room every day containing the same words, "Pericola,

submit. Your Kukishev." And at the critical moment Lubinka most

unexpectedly rushed in.

"Tell me, please, for what prince are you saving your treasure?" she

asked curtly.

Anninka was taken aback. First of all she was amazed to find that both

the Volpino priest and Lubinka employed the same word "treasure" for

maidenly honor. Only the priest had regarded it as the "foundation of

life," while Lubinka looked upon it as a mere trifle over which the

"rascally males" go mad.

Then she involuntarily questioned herself, What is this "treasure,"

anyhow? Is it really a treasure and is it really worth hoarding? Alas,

she could find no satisfactory answer to her questions. On one hand, it

is rather shameful to remain without honor, and on the other----Ah, the

devil take it! And could it be that the whole purpose, the whole merit

of her existence consisted in struggling every moment of her life to

maintain this treasure?

"In only six months I have succeeded in getting thirty bonds," Lubinka

continued, "and lots of things. Look what a dress I have on!"

Lubinka turned about, pulled at the front, then at the sides, letting

herself be examined. The dress was really an expensive one and

unusually well made. It came straight from Minangois in Moscow.

"Kukishev is a kind sort," Lubinka resumed. "He will dress you up like

a doll, and he will give you money. You'll be able to send the theatre

to the devil. You have had enough of it."

"Never!" cried Anninka heatedly. She had not as yet forgotten the

phrase, "sacred art."

"You may remain if you wish to. You will get your former salary again

and outstrip Nalimova."

Anninka was silent.

"Well, good-by. They are waiting for me downstairs. Kukishev is there,

too. Will you come?"

But Anninka maintained her silence.

"Well, think it over, if there is anything to think about. And when you

have done thinking, come to see me. Good-by."

On the seventeenth of September, Lubinka's birthday, the posters of

the Samovarnov theatre announced a gala performance. Anninka appeared

as _Fair Helen_ again, and the same evening the part of Orestes was

performed by Pogorelskaya II, Lubinka. To complete the triumph of the

sisters, Nalimova was given the part of Cleon, the blacksmith. She

appeared on the stage dressed in tights and a short coat, her face

touched with soot, and a sheet of iron in her hands. The audience

was elated. Hardly did Anninka appear on the stage when the audience

raised such a clamor that, already unaccustomed to ovations, she nearly

broke into tears. And when, in the third act, in the scene where she

is awakened at night, she stood up on the sofa almost naked, the house

was one groaning mass of humanity. One man in the audience was so

thoroughly worked up that he shouted to Menelaus, who was entering

the stage, "Get out, damn you!" Anninka understood that the public

had pardoned her. As for Kukishev, he was in full dress, white tie

and white gloves. In the entr'actes he generously treated friends and

strangers alike to champagne and spoke of his triumph with dignity.

At last the manager of the theatre, brimming over with jubilation,

appeared in Anninka's room and, kneeling before her, said, "Now, madam,

you are a good girl and you will get your previous salary with the

corresponding number of benefits."

Everybody praised her and congratulated her and protested their

sympathy, so that she, who at first was timid, restless, and haunted

with a feeling of oppressive melancholy, grew suddenly convinced that

she had fulfilled her mission.

After the theatre the whole company went to Lubinka's birthday

celebration, and there the congratulations were reiterated. So large

a crowd gathered in Lubinka's quarters that the tobacco smoke made it

hard to breathe. They sat down to supper, and champagne began to flow

freely. Kukishev kept close to Anninka. This made her somewhat shy, but

she was no longer oppressed by his attentions. It seemed rather funny,

but also flattering, that she had so easily gotten hold of this big,

powerful man, who could bend and straighten out a horseshoe without

effort, and whom she could order about and do with as she wished.

The supper was crowned by that drunken, disorderly gaiety in which

neither the head nor the heart takes a part, and which results only in

headaches and nausea. The tragedian Miloslavsky X was the only one who

looked gloomy and declined champagne, preferring plain vodka, which he

gulped down glass after glass. As to Anninka, she abstained from drink

for some time, but Kukishev was insistent. He went down on his knees

and implored her:

"Anna Semyonovna, it is your turn. I beseech you. For your happiness,

for friendship and love. Do us a favor."

She was annoyed by his foolish figure and foolish talk, yet she could

not refuse, and before she had time to collect her thoughts, she was

already dizzy. Lubinka, for her part, was so magnanimous that she

herself asked her sister to sing, "How I did love it with my mash."

Anninka performed it so well that everybody exclaimed, "Ah, that was

just like Matryusha the gypsy." Then Lubinka sang an obscene song of

a different kind, and at once convinced everybody that that kind of

singing was her real genre, in which she had no rivals, just as Anninka

had none in the gypsy songs. In conclusion, Miloslavsky X and Nalimova

presented a "masquerade scene" in which the tragedian recited parts

from _Ugolino_ (a tragedy in five acts, by Polevoy), and Nalimova

followed with a scene from an unpublished tragedy of Barkov. The result

was so unexpected that Nalimova nearly eclipsed the two sisters and

almost became the heroine of the evening.

It was already dawn when Kukishev, leaving the charming hostess, helped

Anninka into her carriage. Pious townspeople were coming from matins.

At the sight of Anninka, elaborately attired and somewhat unsteady on

her feet, they muttered darkly, "People are coming out of church, and

they are gulping wine. A curse on them!"

On leaving her sister's, Anninka went not to the hotel but to her own

quarters, small but snug and nicely furnished. She was followed by

Kukishev.

The whole winter passed in an indescribable hurly-burly. Anninka was

completely in the swing, and if she ever reminded herself of her

"treasure," it was only in order to laugh it off with "How foolish I

was!" Kukishev, very proud of the fact that his "idea" of securing a

mistress like Lubinka had materialized, made ducks and drakes of his

money. Instigated by emulation, he ordered two gowns to Lyulkin's one,

and two dozen bottles of champagne to his one dozen. Lubinka herself

began to envy her sister, because she succeeded in laying by forty

lottery bonds during the winter in addition to a considerable amount of

jewelry. However, they became friendly again and decided to pool their

hoardings.

Anninka always hoped for something, and during an intimate talk with

her sister, said:

"When all this will be over, we will go back to Pogorelka. We will have

money and establish a home for ourselves."

"And you think this will ever end? Fool!" Lubinka retorted cynically.

To Anninka's misfortune, Kukishev soon came upon a new "idea," which

he began to pursue with his usual obstinacy. A vulgar and eminently

shallow-pated man, he imagined he would reach the pinnacle of bliss if

his queen would "accompany" him, that is, if she would drink vodka with

him.

Anninka for some time declined, referring to the fact that Lyulkin

never compelled Lubinka to drink vodka.

"And yet she drinks out of love for Lyulkin," Kukishev retorted. "And

may I ask you, darling, do you take the Lyulkins as an example? They

are Lyulkins, while you and I, we are Kukishevs. Therefore we will

drink in our own Kukishev way."

Kukishev had his way. Once Anninka took a small glass of green liquid

from the hands of her "beloved" and gulped it down. Of course she saw

stars, choked, coughed, became dizzy, thereby putting Kukishev in

transports of delight.

"Permit me to remark, darling, that you do not drink well! You did

it too fast," he instructed her, as she quieted down somewhat. "The

wineglass should be held in the tiny hands, so! Then you bring it over

to the lips, slowly--one, two, three--the Lord bless us!"

And he calmly and gravely gulped down the contents of the glass, as if

he were pouring vodka into a barrel. He did not even frown, but only

took a bit of black bread, dipped it in the salt cellar, and chewed it.

And so Kukishev succeeded in realizing his second "idea" and even began

to plan another one, which would beat the Lyulkins hollow. Of course he

succeeded in inventing one.

"You know," he suddenly announced, "as soon as summer comes we will go

to my mill with the Lyulkins, take along some provisions and bathe in

the river."

"Never!" Anninka objected indignantly.

"Why not? We will bathe, then have a cocktail, rest a little, and bathe

again. That would be delightful."

It is not known whether Kukishev's third idea materialized or not, but

it is certain that this drunken debauchery lasted a whole year, during

which time neither the zemstvo nor the city administration exhibited

the slightest anxiety concerning Messrs. Kukishev and Lyulkin. For

appearance's sake Lyulkin visited Moscow twice, and on his return

declared he had sold one of his forests. On being reminded that he had

sold the same forest four years before when living with Domashka the

gypsy, he answered it was another forest that he had sold that time,

and, to give his tale the appearance of veracity, he added detailed

information concerning the name of his newly sold forest-estate. As for

Kukishev, he gave currency to the story that he had smuggled in a large

stock of embroidery from abroad, thereby earning a great deal of money.

In September of the next year the chief of police asked Kukishev for a

"loan" of a thousand rubles and, Kukishev was foolish enough to refuse.

Then the police superintendent began to confer secretly with the

assistant attorney. ("Both of them guzzled champagne in my house every

evening," Kukishev testified later at the trial.) On September 17th,

at the anniversary of Kukishev's _liaison,_ when he and the others

celebrated Lubinka's birthday again, a member of the city council came

running in and announced to Kukishev that a warrant was being made out

at the City Board for his arrest.

"They must have found out something!" Kukishev exclaimed rather

pluckily, and without further comment followed the messenger to the

council-hall, and from there to prison.

The next day the zemstvo council also took fright. The members

assembled and ordered the money in the treasury counted and recounted,

and at last came to the conclusion that their treasury, too, had been

drained by somebody. Lyulkin was present at the examination, pale,

gloomy, but "noble"! When the loss had been discovered, and when it

became apparent to Lyulkin that he had no hope of escaping, he walked

to the window, drew a revolver from his pocket, and fired a bullet into

his temple.

The event created quite a turmoil in the town. The people pitied

Lyulkin, saying, "At least he ended nobly!" But the general opinion

about Kukishev was, "He was born a shopkeeper, and a shopkeeper he

will die!" Concerning Anninka and Lubinka they simply said that "they

were the cause of it all," and that it would not do any harm to put

them behind the bars, too, so that in future matters might not be very

inviting for such wretches.

The prosecutors, however, did not arrest them, but terrorized them so

mercilessly that they were completely dismayed. Of course there were

some kind people who advised them to conceal all their valuables, but

they listened and understood nothing. Owing to this, the attorney

for the plaintiffs (both councils hired the same attorney), a daring

fellow, wishing to satisfy his clients, came to the sisters one day,

accompanied by the process server, to take an inventory. He seized

and sealed everything except their dresses and such gold and silver

things as bore inscriptions showing they had been the gifts of the

appreciative public. Lubinka, however, succeeded in hiding a roll of

bank-notes, presented to her the previous evening, in her corset. It

was a thousand rubles, on which the sisters would have to exist for an

indefinite time.

In expectation of Kukishev's trial, they were kept in the town

about four months. Then the trial began, and the sisters, Anninka

particularly, had to undergo a ruthless ordeal. Kukishev was cynical

in the extreme. He revelled in the disclosure of details, for which

there was really no need, but apparently he was desirous of striking

a pose before the ladies of Samovarnov and exposed everything

indiscreetly. The attorney and the private prosecutor, young and

anxious to afford pleasure to the ladies, took advantage of this and

endeavored to lend the proceeding a frivolous character, in which

they succeeded, of course. Anninka fainted a number of times, but

the private prosecutor paid no attention to this and bombarded her

with questions. At last the investigation ended, and both sides had

their say. Late at night the jurors announced that Kukishev was

guilty, but that there were alleviating circumstances. In view of

this he was sentenced to be deported to Western Siberia. When the

trial was over, the sisters obtained permission to leave Samovarnov.

And it was high time, for the thousand rubles were nearly exhausted.

Besides, the manager of the Kretchetov theatre, with whom they had

made arrangements, demanded that they appear in Kretchetov at once,

threatening to discontinue negotiations if they delayed. Nothing was

seen or heard of the valuables and documents sealed at the demand of

the private prosecutor.

Such were the consequences of their disregard for their "treasure."

Tormented, crushed, despised by everybody, the sisters lost all faith

in their own strength and all hope for a brighter future. They became

emaciated, slovenly, cowardly. And Anninka, to boot, having been in

Kukishev's school, had learned to drink.

Matters grew worse. No sooner did they alight from the train at

Kretchetov than they at once found "protectors." Lubinka was taken

by Captain Popkov, Anninka by the merchant Zabvenny. But the jolly

times were no more. Both Popkov and Zabvenny were coarse, quarrelsome,

and rather close-fisted. After three or four months they became

considerably colder. The sisters were even less successful on the

stage than in love affairs. The manager who had accepted the sisters

on the strength of the scandal they had caused at Samovarnov quite

unexpectedly found himself out of his reckoning. At the very first

performance somebody in the gallery shouted when the two girls made

their appearance on the stage, "You convicts!" And the name stuck. It

decided Anninka's and Lubinka's theatrical fate.

They now lived a dull, drowsy life, devoid of all intellectual

interest. The public was cold, the managers scowled at them, the

"protectors" would not intercede. Zabvenny dreamed, as once Kukishev

had, of how he would "compel" his queen to have a cocktail with him,

how she would at first affect horror, and gradually submit. But he was

very angry when he found out that she was already past mistress in the

art of drinking. The only satisfaction left him was to show his friends

how Anninka "guzzled vodka." Popkov, too, was dissatisfied and declared

Lubinka had grown thin.

"You once had flesh on your bones," he would say, "tell me, where did

you lose it?"

On account of this, he was not only unceremonious with her, but often

even beat her when he was drunk.

Toward the end of the winter the sisters had neither "real" admirers

nor a "permanent position." They still stuck to the theatre, but

there could be no question now either of _Pericola_ or the _Old-time

Colonels._ Lubinka was more cheerful, but Anninka, being more

high-strung, broke down completely. She seemed to have forgotten the

past and was not aware of the present. In addition, she began to cough

suspiciously, apparently on her way toward an enigmatic malady.

Next summer was terrible. Gradually the sisters were taken to hotels

and were given to travelling gentlemen for a moderate fixed price.

Scandals and beatings followed one another, but the sisters clung to

life desperately, with the tenacity of cats. They reminded one of those

wretched dogs who, in spite of being crippled by a beating, crawl back

to their favorite place, whining as they go. It was not proper to keep

women like that on the stage.

In those dark days only once did a ray of light find its way into

Anninka's existence. Miloslavsky X, the tragedian, sent her a letter

from Samovarnov in which he persistently offered her his hand and

heart. Anninka read the letter and cried. The night long she tossed

about in bed, and in the morning she sent a curt reply, "Why? Only that

we may drink together?" Then darkness closed down upon her intenser

than ever, and endless, base debauchery began again.

Lubinka was the first to wake up, or if not to wake up, at least to

feel instinctively that she had lived long enough. There was no work in

sight. Her youth, her beauty, and her embryonic talent, all had somehow

vanished. That they had a shelter in Pogorelka, she never remembered.

It was something distant, vague, long-forgotten. They never did have

much of a liking for Pogorelka, and now their hatred toward the place

was only intensified. Even when they were almost starving the place

attracted her less than ever. And what sort of a figure would she cut

there? A figure which all sorts of drunken, lustful breaths had branded

as a "creature." Those accursed breaths saturated her entire body.

She felt them everywhere, in every place. And what is more horrible,

she grew so accustomed to those disgusting breaths that they became

a part of her very being. So with Anninka, too. Neither the stench

of eating-houses, nor the din of the inns, nor the obscene language

of the drunkards seemed abominable to them, so that had they gone to

Pogorelka, they would surely have missed the "life." Besides, even in

Pogorelka they must have something to live on. All these many years

that they had wandered about the world they had heard nothing of the

revenue that Pogorelka brought. Perhaps the estate was a myth. Perhaps

the folks had all died, all those witnesses of the distant and yet

ever-present years, when they had been brought up by their grandmother,

Arina Petrovna, on sour milk and stale cured meat.

It was clear that it was best for Lubinka to die. Once this thought

dawns on one's consciousness, it becomes an obsession. The sisters not

infrequently had moments of awakening, but in the case of Anninka they

were accompanied by hysterics, sobs, tears, and so passed away faster.

Lubinka was colder by nature. She did not cry or curse, but the thought

that she was a "hussy" constantly preyed on her mind. And Lubinka was

more reasonable and saw quite clearly that there was not even any

profit in their mode of living. For the future she expected nothing but

shame, poverty and the street. Shame is a matter of habit, it can be

tolerated, but poverty--never! It is better to end it all at once.

"We must die," she once said to Anninka in that same cool and

deliberate tone in which two years ago she had asked her for whom she

was saving her "treasure."

"Why?" Anninka objected, somewhat frightened.

"I mean it seriously. We must die," Lubinka repeated. "Understand, wake

up, think!"

"Well--let us die," Anninka assented, hardly realizing the dismal

meaning of her decision.

That same day Lubinka cut off the tips of some matches and prepared two

glasses of the mixture. One of these she drank herself, the other she

offered her sister. But Anninka immediately lost courage and refused to

drink.

"Drink, you slut," Lubinka cried out. "Sister, dearest, darling, drink!"

Anninka, almost insane with fear, ran about the room, instinctively

clutching at her throat as if trying to choke herself.

"Drink, drink--you street-walker!"

The artistic career of the two sisters was ended. That same evening

Lubinka's corpse was taken into the field and buried. Anninka remained

alive.

CHAPTER III

Anninka soon introduced an atmosphere of Bohemian life into Yudushka's

nest. She rose late and would roam about the house until dinner-time,

undressed, uncombed, with an aching head, and coughing in such agony

that each time it would send a shudder through Porfiry Vladimirych

in his study and quite frighten him. Her room was always untidy, the

bedding in disorder, and her clothes lying about on the chairs and

floor. At first she saw her uncle only at dinner and evening tea.

The master of Golovliovo came out of his room all dressed in black,

spoke little, and ate with his old-time exasperating slowness. He

was apparently observing her. After dinner came the early December

twilight. Anninka loved to watch the glimmer of the gray winter day

gradually die out and the fields grow dim; she loved to see the

shadows flood the rooms until finally the whole house was plunged in

impenetrable darkness. In the darkness she always felt at ease and

hardly ever lit the candles. The only one she allowed to burn was at

one end of the sitting-room. It was of cheap palm wax, and sputtered

and dripped, its feeble flame formed a tiny circle of light. For some

time the house would be astir with the usual after-dinner noises.

Plates would rattle in the hands of the dish-washers, and drawers open

and close with a clatter; but soon the sound of receding steps would

be heard and a dead silence begin to reign. Porfiry Vladimirych would

take his after-dinner nap and Yevpraksia bury herself in the bedding in

her room. Prokhor would go into the servants' room, and Anninka would

remain entirely alone.

She would pace from room to room, humming, trying to tire herself out,

but chiefly endeavoring to drive her thoughts away. In walking toward

the sitting-room she would fix her eyes upon the circle of light about

the candle, and walking away from it, she would try to single out some

point in the darkness and keep her eyes fixed on it. But in spite of

her efforts reminiscences surged up in her mind irresistibly. She saw

the dressing-room with its cheap wall paper, the inevitable pier-glass

and the equally inevitable bouquet from Lieutenant Pankov II; the stage

with the stage-properties, sooty, slippery from the damp; the hall with

its pieces of furniture picked up at random and its boxes upholstered

in threadbare purple plush,--the hall which, seen from the stage,

looked trim and even splendid, but in reality was dark and miserable.

And finally--officers, officers, officers without end. Then she saw the

hotel with the vile-smelling corridor, dimly lit by the smoky kerosene

lamp; the room she would dart into in order to change her dress for

further triumphs, the room with the bed in disorder from the morning;

the wash-stand full of dirty water, the bed-sheet lying on the floor,

her cast-off underwear forgotten on a chair. Next she saw herself in

the general dining-room, filled with kitchen odors, the tables set for

supper, with its tobacco smoke, noise, crowds, drinking, debauchery.

And again officers, officers, officers without end.

Such were her memories of the time she had once called the years of

her successes, triumphs, prosperity.

These reminiscences were followed by others, the prominent part in

which was played by the inn, filled with a foul stench, with walls on

which the vapor froze in the winter time, insecure flooring, and board

partitions, the glossy bellies of bed-bugs showing in the crevices.

Nights of drinking and brawls, travelling squires hastily taking

greenbacks out of their meager pocket-books, merchants encouraging the

"actresses" almost with a whip in hand. And in the morning--headaches,

nausea, and utter dejection. At last--Golovliovo.

Golovliovo was death itself, relentless, hollow-wombed death,

constantly lying in wait for new victims. Two uncles had died there,

two cousins had received mortal wounds. And Lubinka! Although Lubinka,

to be sure, had died somewhere in Kretchetov because of her "own

affairs," yet the origin of her wounds went back to her life at

Golovliovo. All the deaths, all the poisonings, all the pestilence,

came from there. There the orphans had been fed on rotten cured

meats, there they heard the first words of hatred and contempt for

human dignity. Not the slightest childish misdeed had passed without

punishment. Nothing could be hidden from the stony-hearted, eccentric

old woman, not an extra bite of bread, not a broken clay doll, not a

torn rag, not a worn shoe. Each breach of law and order was instantly

punished either with a reproach or a slap. And then, when they had

been permitted to dispose of themselves, when they had understood that

they might run away from the disgusting place, they ran--there! And

nobody kept them from running away, nor could they have been kept

from running away, because they could imagine nothing worse or more

repulsive than Golovliovo.

Ah, if all that could only be forgotten, if one could create a

different existence in one's dreams, a magic world that would supplant

both the past and the present! But alas, the reality Anninka had lived

through had so powerful a hold, that the clutch of it suppressed the

feeble efforts of her imagination. In vain did fancy endeavor to

imagine angels with silvery wings. From behind those angels peeped

inexorably the legions of Kukishevs, Lyulkins, Zabvennys, Popkovs.

Lord! Was all lost? Even the ability to deceive and beguile herself?

Had that been lost forever in the night revels, in wine, and in

debauchery? Yet that past had to be killed somehow, so as not to poison

her blood and rend her heart. It had to be crushed, utterly annihilated.

How strange and ruthless was that which had happened! It was impossible

even to conceive of some future, of some door by which to escape from

the situation, of anything at all that might occur to change things.

Nothing could occur. And what was even more unbearable was the fact

that to all intents and purposes she was already dead, with the outward

signs of life yet present. She should have ended it then, along with

Lubinka. Somehow she had remained alive. How was it that the mass of

shame which had come upon her then from all sides had not crushed her?

And what an insignificant worm she must have been to have crept out

from underneath that heap of heavy stones piled up on top of her!

She groaned in agony, and ran about the sitting-room, trying to kill

the burning memories. Before her eyes swam familiar images, the

Duchess of Herolstein shaking a pelisse, Clairette Angot in her wedding

gown with a slit in front up to her waist-line, Fair Helen with slits

in front, behind and at the sides. Nothing but obscenity and nakedness.

That was what her life had consisted of. Could all that possibly have

occurred?

About seven o'clock the house came to life again. The sounds of the

preparations for tea were heard, and at last came the voice of Porfiry

Vladimirych. Uncle and niece sat down at the tea table and exchanged

remarks about the day just ended; but the daily happenings were scanty

and so the conversation was brief. Having taken tea and kissed Anninka

on the forehead, Yudushka crept back into his den, while Anninka went

into Yevpraksia's room to play cards.

At eleven o'clock the debauchery began. Having ascertained that Porfiry

Vladimirych was fast asleep, Yevpraksia set the table with various

country corned meats and a bottle of vodka. Now came meaningless and

obscene songs, strumming on the guitar, and Anninka drinking between

the songs and the shameless talk. At first she drank after Kukishev's

manner, coolly, with a "Lord bless us" to each glass, but then she

gradually sank into gloom and began to moan and curse. Yevpraksia

looked at her and pitied her:

"As I look at you, lady," she said, "I am so sorry for you, so sorry."

"Drink with me and you won't be sorry," Anninka retorted.

"No, how can I? They nearly chased me out of the clergy estate because

of your uncle, and now if I become----"

"Well, then it can't be helped. Let me sing you _The Mustache._"

She strummed the guitar again, and again came the cry, "I-akh! I-okh!"

Late at night sleep would suddenly overtake her, obliterating her past

and allaying her sufferings for a few hours. The next day, broken down,

half-insane, she would again creep out from beneath the deadening load

of sleep and live anew.

One of those vile nights when Anninka was singing her filthy songs to

Yevpraksia, Yudushka's pale face, ghastly and harassed, appeared in the

doorway. His lips were quivering, his sunken eyes looked like sightless

cavities by the light of the candle. His hands were folded for prayer.

For a few seconds he stood in front of the dumfounded women, and then

slowly faced round and passed out.

CHAPTER IV

There are families that are weighed down by an inevitable fate. They

are frequent among that portion of the nobility which once lived idle,

useless, and uninfluential, under the wing of serfdom in all parts of

Russia and is now passing its last days helpless and unprotected in

dilapidated manor-houses. In the life of these wretched families both

success and failure come unexpectedly and as if by sheer accident.

Sometimes it happens that a shower of good luck, as it were, suddenly

comes streaming down on such a family. The ruined cornet and his wife,

peacefully fading away in an out-of-the-way village, will suddenly be

blessed with a brood of young people, strong, clean, alert, pushing,

adaptable to the new conditions of life--the boys as well as the

girls--in a word, "knowing ones." The boys pass examinations with

flying colors and even establish connections and procure patrons

while still at school. In the nick of time they exhibit their modesty

(_"j'aime cette modestie"_ their superiors say about them), and in the

nick of time they show that they can be independent (_"j'aime cette

indépendance!"_) They quickly scent the direction from which the wind

blows, but they never burn their bridges, so that retreat is free

and easy. These successful makers of our modern history begin with

obsequious cringing, and almost invariably end with perfidy. As to

the girls, they, too, in their line, contribute to the regeneration of

the family, that is, they all marry successfully and then exhibit so

much tact in the art of dressing that they experience no difficulty in

gaining prominent places in so-called society.

From this combination of circumstances, success fairly pours down upon

the impoverished family. The first successful members who struggle

through courageously, bring up another clean generation, which is still

better off because the main paths have not only been broken but also

well trodden. Other generations succeed until at last a family comes

that has no preliminary struggles and deems it has an inborn right to

lifelong rejoicing.

Lately, on account of a modern demand for so-called "new men" resulting

from the gradual degeneration of the old men, there have been frequent

instances of successful families. Even in earlier days a comet would

now and then make its appearance on the horizon, but it was a rare

occurrence, the reason being that, first, there were no cracks in the

wall surrounding that blissful region over the gateway to which is

inscribed: "Here pies are eaten daily," and, secondly, because in order

to penetrate into that region, one had to have genuine ability. But now

quite a number of cracks have appeared and the matter of penetration is

considerably simplified, since great merits are no longer demanded of

the newcomer, but only "newness" and nothing else.

Besides these lucky families there is a great multitude of families

upon whose members the household gods bestow nothing but misfortune

and despair. Like a baleful blight, vice and ill-luck beset them and

devour their substance. The malignant influences attack the whole

stock, eating their way into the very heart and laying waste generation

after generation. There is born a race of weaklings, drunkards, petty

rakes, idlers and shiftless ne'er-do-wells. As time goes on the race

degenerates more and more, until finally there appear miserable

weaklings, like Yudushka's two sons, who perish at the first onslaught

of life.

Such a sinister fate pursued the Golovliovo family. For several

generations, their history was marked by three characteristics,

idleness, utter uselessness, and habitual hard drinking, the last

coming as the sorry crown to a chaotic life. The Golovliovo family

would have run to seed completely but for the fact that Arina Petrovna

flashed like a casual meteor through this drunken confusion. By her

personal energy alone this woman brought the family to an unprecedented

height of prosperity. Nevertheless her labors were in vain. Not only

did she not transmit any of her qualities to her children, but she

herself died ensnared by idleness, empty talk and mental vacuity.

Until now Porfiry Vladimirych had held out against the temptation of

drink. It may be that he had been frightened off by the fate of his

brothers and had consciously abstained from drink, or that he had

been satisfied by the intoxication of his frenzied day dreams. But it

was not for nothing that he had the reputation of a drunkard among

his neighbors. At times he himself felt something was lacking in his

existence. Idle musings gave him much, but not all. They did not supply

that sharp, stupefying sensation which would completely do away with

his sense of reality and plunge him headlong into the void forever.

And now the long-wished-for opportunity presented itself. Ever since

Anninka's arrival, Yudushka had been aware of a vague noise at night

coming from the other end of the house. For a long time he had puzzled

his head over the significance of the mysterious sounds. At last he

discovered what they were.

Anninka expected a reprimand the next day. None came. Porfiry

Vladimirych spent the morning locked up in his study as usual, but when

he appeared at the midday meal, he poured out two wineglasses of vodka

instead of only one for himself, and pointed to one with a sheepish

smile. Anninka accepted the silent invitation.

"So you say Lubinka is dead?" said Yudushka when the dinner was well

under way, as if recalling something.

"Yes, uncle, she is dead."

"Well, God rest her soul! To grumble is a sin, but to honor her memory

is quite fitting. Shall we?"

"Yes, uncle, let's honor her memory."

They emptied one more glass, and then Yudushka grew silent. He was

evidently still unaccustomed to the society of human beings. When the

meal was over, Anninka, performing a family rite, kissed uncle's cheek,

and in response he patted her on her cheek and said:

"So that's the kind you are."

The evening of the same day, at tea, which lasted longer this time

than usual, Porfiry Vladimirych looked at his niece for a while with a

quizzical smile, and finally said:

"Shall we have some corned meats served?"

"Well, if you wish."

"Yes. It's better you should do it in uncle's sight than on the sly. At

least, uncle will----"

Yudushka did not finish the sentence. Perhaps he had wanted to say that

uncle would keep her from drinking, but something prevented him from

saying it.

From that time on cold cuts were served in the dining-room every

evening. The outer window shutters were closed, the servants retired,

and uncle and niece remained all alone. In the beginning Yudushka did

not keep pace with Anninka, but with a little practice he came up to

her. They sat slowly sipping their vodka and talking. The conversation,

at first dull and indifferent, became more and more animated as their

heads grew hotter, and invariably passed into a chaotic quarrel, at

the bottom of which were always reminiscences about the victims of

Golovliovo.

Anninka started the quarrels. She dug up the family archives with

ruthless persistence and delighted in teasing Yudushka by arguing that

he along with Arina Petrovna had been the chief cause of the Golovliovo

tragedies. Every word breathed such cynicism and such burning hatred

that it was difficult to understand how so much vitality could still

exist in that worn-out, shattered body. Anninka's attacks galled

Yudushka immensely, but he defended himself feebly, angrily sputtering

ejaculations of discomfiture. At times, when Anninka went too far in

her insolence, he shouted and cursed.

Such scenes repeated themselves day in, day out, without change. Every

detail of the pitiful family chronicle was speedily exhausted, but it

still held the minds of the two riveted. Every episode of the past

lacerated some wound in their hearts, and they felt a bitter delight

in constantly evoking, scrutinizing and exaggerating painful memories.

Neither the past nor the present contained any moral mainstay on which

Anninka could lean. Nothing but sordid stinginess on one side, and

mental vacuity on the other. Her youthful heart had thirsted for warmth

and love, but had received a stone instead of bread, blows instead of

instruction. By the irony of fate, the cruel school in which she had

been taught implanted in her not an austere attitude toward life, but a

passionate yearning to partake of its sweet poisons. Youth had wrought

the miracle of oblivion, it kept her heart from hardening and the germs

of hatred from developing. Youth had made her drunk with the thirst for

life. That was why a turbulent, furtive debauchery had held her in its

sway for several years, and had pushed Golovliovo into the background.

Now, when the end was drawing close, her heart began to ache. Now for

the first time did Anninka grasp the significance of her past and begin

to hate it truly.

The drinking lasted far into the night, and had it not been for the

drunken confusion of both thoughts and words, it might have resulted in

something frightful. But if alcohol opened the well-springs of pain in

these shattered hearts, it also appeased them. The further the night

advanced, the more incoherent became their talk and the more impotent

their hatred. Toward the end of the debauch, the aching disappeared and

their surroundings vanished from their eyes, supplanted by a shining

void. They faltered, their eyes closed, they grew muscle-bound. Uncle

and niece would then rise from their places and retire to their rooms

with tottering steps.

Of course, these night adventures could not remain a secret. Before

long the notion of crime became associated with them in the minds of

the servants. Life abandoned the vast Golovliovo manor-house. Nothing

stirred even in the morning. Uncle and niece rose late and till the

midday meal Anninka's racking cough, accompanied by curses, rang from

one end of the house to the other. Yudushka listened to the harrowing

sounds in terror and a vague presentiment of his own impending doom

stirred in him.

It seemed that all the Golovliovo victims were now creeping from out of

the nooks and crannies of the deserted house. Gray apparitions stirred

everywhere. Here was old Vladimir Mikhailovich, in his white nightcap,

making wry faces and citing Barkov; here was Simple Simon and Pavel

the Sneak; here were Lubinka and the last offshoots of the Golovliovo

stock, Volodya and Petka. All were drunk, lustful, weary and bleeding.

And over all these ghosts there brooded a living phantom, Porfiry

Vladimirych Golovliov, the last representative of the decadent family.

CHAPTER V

The continual reverting to the past and its victims was bound to have

its effect on Yudushka. The natural outcome--was it fear?--No, rather

the awakening of conscience. He discovered he had a conscience, and

oblivion and contempt, although blunting its sensitiveness, could not

destroy it.

The awakening of a torpid conscience is usually fraught with pain. It

brings no peace, holds no promise of a new life, but merely tortures,

endlessly and fruitlessly. Man sees himself immured in a narrow prison,

a helpless victim of the agonies of repentance, with no hope of ever

returning to life. And he perceives no other way of allaying his

gnawing pain than to break his head against the stony walls of the

prison cell.

Never in the course of his long, useless life had it occurred to

Yudushka that dire tragedies were interwoven with his existence. He had

lived peacefully and calmly, with a constant prayer on his lips, and

the thought had been far from him that this manner of life had caused

so much sorrow. Least of all could he imagine that he himself had been

the source of these tragedies. Suddenly the terrible truth was revealed

to his conscience, but all too late--too late for him to make amends

for the crimes of his life. He was unsociable, old, with one foot

in the grave, and there was not a single human being who approached

him with loving pity. Why was he alone? Why did he see nothing but

indifference and hatred around him? Why was it that everything he

touched had perished? This estate of Golovliovo was once so full, a

human nest. How had it happened that now there was not a trace, not a

feather left? Of the fledgelings nursed there his niece was the only

one that remained alive, and she had come back only to sneer at him and

deal him his deathblow. Even Yevpraksia, simple as she was, hated him.

She lived at Golovliovo because Porfiry sent her father, the sacristan,

provisions every month, but undoubtedly she hated him. He had made her

unhappy, too, by robbing her of her child. What was the outcome of his

existence? Wherefore had he lied, babbled, persecuted, hoarded? Who

would inherit his wealth? Who was to enjoy the fruits of his life? Who?

I repeat, his conscience had awakened. Yudushka waited for the evening

with feverish impatience not only in order to get bestially drunk,

but also to drown his conscience. He hated the "dissolute wench," who

lacerated his wounds with such cold cynicism, yet he was drawn to

her irresistibly, as if there was still something to be said between

them and some wounds to be torn open. Every evening he made Anninka

retell the story of Lubinka's death, and every evening the idea of

self-destruction became riper in his mind. At first, the idea occurred

to him casually. But as his iniquities became more apparent to him, it

sank deeper and deeper into his being and soon was the sole shining

spot in all the gloom he saw ahead of him.

And his health began to decline rapidly. He coughed violently and at

times had spells of asthma that in themselves were sufficient to make

life intolerable, let alone the moral pangs from which he suffered.

All the symptoms of the malady that had sent his brothers to their

graves were present. He heard the groans of his brother Pavel, as he

choked in the entresol of the Dubrovino manor-house. Still Yudushka

was doggedly tenacious of life. His sunken, emaciated chest held out

against the pain that grew from hour to hour. It was as if his body too

were resisting with unexpected vigor so as to take revenge on him for

his crimes.

"Is this the end?" he would wonder hopefully, whenever he felt the

approach of a paroxysm. But death was slow in coming. Evidently it

would be necessary to use violence to hasten the end. All his accounts

with life were settled--it was both painful and useless to him. What he

needed was death, but, to his sorrow, death was slow in coming. There

is something mean and treacherous in the teasing hesitancy of death

when it is called upon with all the strength of one's soul.

* * * * *

It was late in March and Passion Week was nearing its end. However

abject Yudushka's condition was, he preserved an attitude of reverence

toward the sanctity of these days implanted in him in his childhood.

His thoughts of themselves took a serious turn, and there was no other

desire in his heart than complete silence. In this mood the evenings

were no longer spent in wild drinking, but passed in gloomy silence.

Porfiry Vladimirych and Anninka were sitting all alone in the

dining-room. The evening service, accompanied by the reading of the

gospel, had just ended, and the odor of incense still lingered in the

room. The clock struck ten, the servants had retired, and deep, pensive

quiet settled over the house. Anninka, her hands clasping her head, was

deep in thought. Porfiry Vladimirych sat opposite, silent and sad.

Upon Anninka the Passion Week evening service always made an

overwhelming impression. As a child she had wept bitterly at the

priest's words: "And when they plaited a crown of thorns, they put it

upon His head, and a reed in His right hand," and in a tremulous treble

she used to sing after the sexton: "Glory be to Thy long-suffering,

oh, Lord! Glory be to Thee!" After the service she used to run, all

a-quiver with emotion, to the maids' room, and there, in the growing

twilight (Arina Petrovna allowed no candles in that room when there

was no work being done), she related "The Passion of our Lord" to the

servants. Silent tears flowed from the eyes of the slaves, and they

heaved deep sighs. The poor servants felt their Master and Redeemer

with their whole hearts and believed He would arise from the dead,

arise from the dead in truth. Anninka, too, felt and believed. Beyond

the gloom of their life of suffering and persecution, all these poor

in spirit beheld the radiant kingdom of freedom. Even the old lady,

usually so redoubtable, was gentle during Passion Week. She did not

grumble or remind Anninka that she was an orphan. On the contrary, she

fondled her and soothed her with kindly words. But Anninka was restless

even in bed, she tossed about and talked to herself in her sleep.

Then came her school years and wanderings, the first empty, the second

painful. But even as a nomadic actress, Anninka had jealously observed

the "holy days," calling back echoes of her distant past and moods of

childlike devotion. But now when she saw her life clearly to its last

detail, when she had cursed her life and when it became obvious that

the future promised neither repentance nor forgiveness, when the source

of devotion and the well-spring of tears had dried up, the effect

of the tale of the Crucifixion upon her was truly overwhelming. In

childhood a gloomy night had surrounded her, but beyond the darkness

she had sensed the presence of light. Now nothing but interminable

everlasting night stretched ahead endlessly. She neither sighed,

nor was agitated, nor even thought. She merely sank into a state of

profound torpor.

Porfiry Vladimirych, too, from his very childhood, had revered the

"holy days," but, true idol-worshipper that he was, he had observed

merely the rites. Every year on the eve of Good Friday he had had

the priest come and read the gospel, had sighed, lifted up his arms,

touched the ground with his forehead, marked the number of chapters

read by means of wax balls, but had understood nothing. Not until now,

when his conscience was awakened, had he grasped the fact that the

gospel contained the story of how Untruth visited a bloody judgment on

Truth.

Of course, it would be an exaggeration to say that this discovery led

him to definite conclusions about his own life, yet there is no doubt

that it produced in him a commotion bordering on despair. This state of

mind was the more painful the more unconsciously he lived through the

past which was the source of his commotion.

There was something terrible in his past, he could not tell exactly

what. It was as if a mountainous mass, hitherto motionless and hidden

by an impenetrable veil, had suddenly moved upon him, threatening every

moment to crush him. What he feared was that he might not be crushed,

and he felt he must hasten the climax. He had been brooding over the

idea for quite some time. "We shall have communion on Saturday,"

suddenly flashed through his mind. "It would be well to visit dear

mother's grave and take leave of her."

"Shall we walk over to the cemetery?" he turned to Anninka and

explained his idea to her.

"Why, if you wish, we'll drive out there."

"No, not drive, but----" started Porfiry Vladimirych, but halted

abruptly, as if struck by the thought that Anninka might be in his way.

"I have sinned against my dear departed mother. I, I was the cause of

her death!"

The thought preyed on him, and the desire to "take leave" grew stronger

in his heart, to take leave not by mere conventional words, but by

throwing himself on her grave and bursting out in the sobs of a death

agony.

"So you say no one is to be blamed for Lubinka's death?" he suddenly

asked, as if trying to cheer himself up.

At first Anninka paid no attention to his question. Two or three

minutes later, however, she felt an irresistible impulse to return to

the subject of Lubinka's death and torment herself with it.

"And her words were, 'Drink, you street-walker,'" he said, after she

had repeated the story in detail.

"Yes, her very words."

"And you didn't drink?"

"I didn't. I am alive, as you see."

He rose and paced up and down the room several times, visibly affected.

At last he went over to Anninka and stroked her head.

"My poor, poor Anninka!" he said softly.

At the touch of his hands a startling change took place in her. At

first she was amazed, then her face began to work, and suddenly a

violent torrent of hysterical, inhuman sobs burst from her chest.

"Uncle, are you good? Tell me, are you good?" she fairly shrieked.

In a broken voice, through tears and sobs, she kept on reiterating her

query, the same she had asked him the day of her return to Golovliovo,

to which he had given such an absurd reply.

"You are good? Tell me, answer me, are you good?"

"Did you hear what the priest read at the evening service?" he said,

when she finally grew calm. "Oh, what sufferings He underwent! Only

such sufferings can----And yet He forgave, forgave forever!"

He resumed his pacing, his very soul rent with suffering and his face

covered with beads of perspiration.

"He pardoned every one," he reflected aloud. "Not only those who at

that time gave Him vinegar mingled with gall to drink, but also those

who are doing the same thing now and will do it again in future ages.

What a horror!"

Suddenly he stopped before her and said:

"And you--have you forgiven?"

Instead of replying she threw herself on him and clasped him firmly.

"You must forgive me," he went on. "For every one--on your own

account--and for those who are no longer here. What has happened?" he

cried, looking round distractedly. "Where are they all?"

* * * * *

Utterly shaken and exhausted, they retired to their rooms. But Porfiry

Vladimirych could not sleep. He tossed in his bed, all the while trying

to recall an obligation that lay on him. Suddenly he clearly remembered

the words that had flashed through his mind about two hours before, "I

must walk to mother's grave and take leave of her."

An exhausting restlessness seized his being. At last he got up and

donned his dressing-gown. It was still dark, and unbroken silence

reigned in the house. For a while Porfiry Vladimirych paced back and

forth in the room, stopped before the lighted ikon of the Saviour

with a thorny crown, and scanned his face. Finally he determined upon

a course of action, perhaps half-unconsciously. He stole into the

antechamber and opened the outer door.

Outside a March blizzard was raging and blinded him with a torrent of

sleet. Porfiry Vladimirych struggled along the road, splashing through

the puddles, insensible to the wind and the snow. Instinctively he drew

together the skirts of his dressing-gown.

* * * * *

Early next morning a messenger came speeding from the village near

the churchyard where Arina Petrovna was buried. He brought the news

that the frozen body of the Golovliovo master had been found by the

roadside. The servants rushed into Anninka's room. She lay in her bed

unconscious in delirium. A messenger was hastily dispatched to Nadezhda

Ivanovna Galkina (daughter of Aunt Varvara Mikhailovna), who ever since

the previous autumn had been keeping a watchful eye on everything

taking place at Golovliovo.

THE END

End of Project Gutenberg's A Family of Noblemen, by Mikhaïl Saltykov